The Bread of Life

Reflection on Luke 9:11-17

What is the greatest treasure of the Catholic Church? It is the Holy Eucharist, the Sacrament of the Body and Blood of Christ. No wonder the Second Vatican Council described it as "the source and summit of the whole Christian life" because in it the faithful "offer the divine Victim to God and offer themselves along with it." The Council also said that "the most blessed Eucharist contains the Church's entire spiritual wealth, that is Christ Himself, our Passover. and living bread." All that is to say that the Holy Eucharist is quite simply Christ himself. Or again, as the Catechism puts, the Holy Eucharist is the “true Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ”, under the appearances of bread and wine.

The Catholic Church dares to take Jesus at his words. Sometime during his public ministry, Jesus made a quite astonishing pronouncement. He told his audience that they would have to eat his body and drink his blood in, order to have life in them, and anyone who ate his body and drank his blood would have eternal life (John 6:51-58). Many of his listeners were, quite naturally, put off at the prospect of having to eat his flesh and drink his blood since they were not cannibals. As a matter of fact, many of them began to go away, saying, "This is intolerable language. How can anyone accept it?” (John 6:60).

Jesus did not call them back to offer an explanation or to I say that he had been misunderstood. Instead, he insisted that he meant exactly what he said: they would have to eat his body and drink his blood. Take it or leave it! Even the Twelve (Apostles) did not know what to make of Jesus’ pronouncement at the time. But they elected to stay with him, whatever he meant by his statement. Simon Peter spoke for all of them. He said, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the message of eternal life, an we believe…” (John 6:68).'

Only at the Last Supper, when Jesus took bread and said, "This is my body, which is for you”, and he took the cup filled with wine and said, “This is the new covenant in my blood”, did the Apostles finally understand what Jesus meant on the earlier occasion. What he meant was that they would have to eat his body and drink his blood in the forms of bread and wine. But the bread and wine would no longer be bread and wine. They would have transformed into the real body and blood of Christ. They would still have all the physical characteristics of bread and wine, but the real substance of bread and wine would have given way to the body and blood of Christ. That is the process Catholic theology has traditionally called Transubstantiation.

From the onset, Jesus meant the Holy Eucharist, the Sacrament of his Body and Blood for the spiritual nourishment of his followers. He told them to eat and drink. By doing so, they would draw life from him (John 6:57). That is to say they would live with the very life of Christ. They would be able to say with St. Paul, " ... I am alive; yet it is no longer I, but Christ living in me" (Gal. I 2:20). That life of Christ in them would ensure that they live eternally, precisely as he had promised.

All that is what makes the Holy Eucharist the Bread of Life for us Christians. If we only understood it for what it really is, none of us would ever let an opportunity to, partake of it pass us by. And if there was any obstacle in the way of our partaking of it, we would leave no stone unturned to remove it.